This support raised concerns in the White House that Beijing would undermine Western efforts to help Ukrainian forces defend their country, several US officials said.
Jake Sullivan will meet China’s top diplomat Yang Jiechi in Rome on Monday. In this meeting, the representative of the US government plans to clarify Washington’s concerns, while outlining the consequences and the growing isolation that China will face on a global scale if it increases its support for Russia, a White House official explained, without providing details. .
When asked about Russia’s request for military aid, first reported by the Financial Times, Liu Pengyu, a spokesman for the Chinese embassy in Washington, said: “I have never heard of it.”
He explained that China finds the situation in Ukraine “puzzling,” adding: “We support and encourage all efforts leading to a peaceful resolution of the crisis.”
Attacks on border near Poland
Russian missiles hit a Ukrainian base near the border with NATO member Poland on Sunday, killing 35 people and wounding 134, a local official said, escalating the war into the country’s west as heavy fighting was reported. in other places.
The Russian Defense Ministry said the airstrike destroyed a large number of weapons supplied by foreign countries that were stored in the extensive training facility and killed “up to 180 foreign mercenaries.”
The attack on the Yavoriv International Center for Peacekeeping and Security, a base just 25 kilometers from the Polish border that previously housed NATO military instructors, brought the conflict to the doorstep of the Western defense alliance.
Russia had warned on Saturday that convoys of weapons shipments from the West to Ukraine could be considered legitimate targets.